Machismo was a funny thing; I was only just starting to figure it out. There was a whole new set of rules to learn about how a man should comport himself in public. If you looked too long at a guy whom you didn't know, he'd bristle and stare back at you; waiting for you to flinch first: that was machismo. If you happened to be in traffic, he would gun his engine and peel out when the lights changed hoping you would race him: more machismo. It was also macho to fly into a jealous rage - I had already learned the hard way that it didn't do to gaze too appreciatively at a pretty woman if she was on another man's arm.